Hermione Loves
by werechick
Summary: (FEMSLASH: Hermione/Ginny, SLASH: Ron/Harry, HET: Ron/Hermione) ::Complete:: Hermione is always the last to know she loves someone.


Ginny was my first love, the sort of pure and fluffy love that comes along but once in one's lifetime. She was so silent, so insecure, but also so determinedly loveable. I had fancied her brother, and she had fancied my closest friend, Harry.

It was so obvious, I can't believe it. What we loved about the boys were what we loved about each other. Harry was string, independent but not insensitive, and brave, as was I. Ron was loyal, fierce, protective and frank, honest with everyone. Like her.

We sat up at night, talking about those two. They would realize they really did love us soon enough. Harry realized he was in love with someone, but it wasn't Ginny. It was Ron. Ron who had protected him, Ron who cared for him. Ginny realized the one who loved Hermione was herself.

We were sitting out on her parent's porch, slurping on ice cream we had bought in Ottery St. Catchpole's only general store. It was hot that summer after my sixth year, and ice cream was soon running down the sides of my mouth. I was giggling at something Gin had said. She had said something about catching Flitwick in a Dolly Parton wig, dancing along to each song on a small record player.

"Really then---"

"Hermione?" she said, cutting me off mid-sentence. "I need to tell you something. Something important."

She didn't even wait for my reply. "Hermione? I'm gay."

I was shocked. It's not everyday my best friend in the world, the one I talked with about boys to, the one I helped with her homework... not everyday that one tells me those life changing words. I didn't say a word.

"Hermione? Are you mad at me?"

"No!" I wanted to scream, I wanted to shout it at the top of my lungs, that I liked girls too, and that I wanted nothing more than to feel her lips pressed against mine and her arms around me in a passionate embrace. But I could not speak.

"It's okay if you're mad at me... I'll just go. You can sleep in Percy's room tonight, if you feel uncomfortable in mine," she turned, her back to me, heading for the door.

"Ginny? I'm not mad at you."

"Really?"

"Really. If you don't mind me asking... do you have a girlfriend?"

"No... I've never even kissed a girl, or a boy, for that matter."

"Sixteen years old, beautiful and never been kissed..." I said, blurting my thoughts aloud. I am an idiot.

"Do you really think that?"

"Really think what?"

"That I'm beautiful."

"Yes."

"You are too, Hermione. You'll make my brother very happy some day... when he pulls his head out of his arse and realizes he loves you."

"That won't happen."

"Why not?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Because he loves Harry."

"Oh... I... never knew..." she started to speak, but I cut her short.

"And I love you."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

We wound up spending years together. The best years of our lives, actually. It couldn't last forever, though. All good things must end.

Harry and Ginny were sent on an intelligence mission. A very dangerous one, with high risks, but for a good cause. The free world depended on it.

"Hermione?" she called to me. She asked, oh so sweetly, to go. She wouldn't do it without knowing I was okay with it. I had to let her.

Ginny shipped out to France two weeks later. They shipped my love back in a box a year after that. Harry was killed as well. But the dark lord was dead; there was no threat now.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Ron and I... we did what we could to put the pieces back together. He moved on without Harry, and I moved on without Ginny. It was incredible, that two people that had been such a big part of our lives could just fall away from us so suddenly. I carried on, so did Ron.

But it was a hollow existence, without them. I kept thinking they were just outside the door, or around the corner. When I heard a good joke, the first thing that popped into my head was "God... I have to tell Gin that one." Then I would remember: Gin is dead. I used to see them, both of them, her and Harry out of the corner of my eye. As soon as I would turn, they were gone.

Ron was going through it too, in his own way. He wouldn't mention their names, though and insisted on living as if his best friend and his sister had never existed.

After a time, I convinced him to move in with me. Partly because I felt he needed me, partly because of money reasons. Apartments in London aren't cheap, and without Harry, he was having a hard time making ends meet.

We tried our best to make it all fit, but the two beds simply wouldn't fit into our tiny bedroom. We would have to share one.

For the first few nights, I would almost daily wake up with his arm around me, or mine around him. It was a subconscious reflex, something he had done out of habit from Harry, and I out of habit from Ginny. Nothing romantic at all. I thought.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

One night I had the strangest dream... I woke up with Ginny lying on my chest, breathing softly. I was about to kiss her when I realized it couldn't be: Ginny was dead. But this Ginny was very much alive, I could feel her breathing. I knew it must either be a dream or a miracle. Not being a religious person, I figured it was the former, as opposed to the latter.

I kissed her anyway, softly on the top of her head, and she looked up, kissing me on the cheek. She was awake after all. "Hermione?"

"Yes?" I played along with my little dream.

"You don't love me," she said frankly and honestly, as if declaring the sky was blue, that grass was green, or that Weasleys have tempers.

"Gin... I do."

"No, you don't. And it's okay; I didn't expect you to stay stuck on me forever. You love someone else, Hermione. Its alright, you have my blessing, lover girl."

She started to fade away, into this deep mist. "Gin! Who...?" I started to ask, but she was already gone. I woke up soon after.

Lying awake in bed, Ron's head was snuggled up on my stomach. A single thought crossed my mind: "I know who I love."


End file.
